Bible Strands
Jeremiah 7:33
The corpses of this people will become food for the birds of the air and the beasts of the earth, and there will be no one to scare them away.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — Jeremiah delivers this declaration of Yahweh to the people of Judah at the temple gate, immediately after announcing that the Valley of Ben-hinnom will be renamed the Valley of Slaughter. The prophecy marks the transition from covenant warning to enacted desolation.
The words — The Hebrew נִבְלַת (nivlat) refers specifically to unburied, rotting corpses, while מַֽאֲכָל (ma'akhal) literally means food or provision. These terms describe the complete inversion of burial customs into unclean scavenging.
The thread — This image of unburied corpses becoming scavenger food echoes Deuteronomy 28:26 and reappears in Revelation 19:17 as an angel summons birds to a divine banquet. Jeremiah 12:9 also employs avian imagery to depict the scattering of God’s inheritance.
Why it lands — The text establishes that persistent rejection of covenant obligations results in total abandonment, leaving the dead without mourners and the land without habitation. It requires a reader to acknowledge that divine judgment operates through concrete, irreversible consequences rather than abstract warning.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
And the carcases of this people shall be meat for the fowls of the heaven, and for the beasts of the earth; and none shall fray them away.
Cross-references
- Deuteronomy 28:26 Your corpses will be food for all the birds of the air and beasts of the earth, with no one to scare them away.
- Jeremiah 12:9 Is not My inheritance to Me like a speckled bird of prey with other birds of prey circling against her? Go, gather all the beasts of the field; bring them to devour her.
- Revelation 19:17 Then I saw an angel standing in the sun, and he cried out in a loud voice to all the birds flying overhead, “Come, gather together for the great supper of God,
- Psalms 79:2 They have given the corpses of Your servants as food to the birds of the air, the flesh of Your saints to the beasts of the earth.
- Jeremiah 8:1 “At that time,” declares the LORD, “the bones of the kings of Judah, the bones of the officials, the bones of the priests, the bones of the prophets, and the bones of the people of Jerusalem will be removed from their graves.
- Jeremiah 9:22 Declare that this is what the LORD says: “The corpses of men will fall like dung upon the open field, like newly cut grain behind the reaper, with no one to gather it.”
- Jeremiah 16:4 “They will die from deadly diseases. They will not be mourned or buried, but will lie like dung on the ground. They will be finished off by sword and famine, and their corpses will become food for the birds of the air and beasts of the earth.”
- Jeremiah 19:7 And in this place I will ruin the plans of Judah and Jerusalem. I will make them fall by the sword before their enemies, by the hands of those who seek their lives, and I will give their carcasses as food to the birds of the air and the beasts of the earth.
- Jeremiah 22:19 He will be buried like a donkey, dragged away and thrown outside the gates of Jerusalem.
- Jeremiah 25:33 Those slain by the LORD on that day will be spread from one end of the earth to the other. They will not be mourned, gathered, or buried. They will be like dung lying on the ground.